US 11,601,327 B1 · Network adaptation based on assessment of meteorological impact

Abstract

A network-management system capable of reducing negative impacts of natural disasters on network services. In an example embodiment, in response to an indication of potential failure of one or more network resources in a meteorological event, the network controller operates to orchestrate re-hosting of affected VNFs and perform SDN-based reconfiguration of switches to adapt the traffic flows to the re-hosted VNFs. The indication of potential failure can be provided, e.g., by a specialized application capable of estimating the probabilities of failure for individual network resources based on a plurality of inputs, such as digital weather forecasts for the corresponding geographical area, geographical locations of individual network resources, tolerances of different network resources to specific environmental conditions, previous history of network damage in the same geographical area, alerts from power suppliers, etc. Upon reconfiguration, the network may beneficially have a lower likelihood of service disruptions and/or outages during the meteorological event.

Claims19

Dependent claims

An apparatus, comprising:

an electronic network controller having an application-programming interface to receive therethrough an indication of potential failure of at least one of network resources during a meteorological event, the network resources including a plurality of servers to host virtual network functions (VNFs) and a plurality of switches configurable using software defined networking (SDN);
wherein, in response to the received indication, the electronic network controller is configured to:
orchestrate re-hosting of at least one VNF component to a different one of the servers;
and
perform SDN-based reconfiguration of at least one of the switches to adapt network traffic to the at least one VNF component being hosted at the different one of the servers;
wherein, prior to the re-hosting, at least one of the VNFs has different VNF components thereof hosted at a first set of two or more different ones of the servers;
and
wherein, in response to receiving the indication of the potential failure, the electronic network controller is configured to orchestrate re-hosting of the at least one of the VNFs to a different second set of the servers.

5 more elements

A non-transitory machine-readable medium, having encoded thereon program code, wherein, when the program code is executed by a machine, the machine implements a method comprising:

estimating individual probabilities of failure for individual ones of network resources during a meteorological event, the network resources including a plurality of servers to host virtual network functions (VNFs) and a plurality of switches configurable using software defined networking (SDN);
selecting re-hosting of at least one VNF component to a different one of the servers based on the individual probabilities;
and
transmitting to an electronic network controller one or more instructions to orchestrate the re-hosting and to perform SDN-based reconfiguration of at least one of the switches to adapt network traffic to the at least one VNF component being hosted at the different one of the servers;
wherein, prior to the re-hosting, at least one of the VNFs has different VNF components thereof hosted at a first set of two or more different ones of the servers;
and
wherein, in response to receiving the indication of the potential failure, the electronic network controller is configured to orchestrate re-hosting of the at least one of the VNFs to a different second set of the servers.

4 more elements

A machine-implemented method, comprising:

estimating individual probabilities of failure for individual ones of network resources during a meteorological event, the network resources including a plurality of servers to host virtual network functions (VNFs) and a plurality of switches configurable using software defined networking (SDN);
selecting re-hosting of at least one VNF component to a different one of the servers based on the individual probabilities;
and
transmitting to an electronic network controller a set of instructions to orchestrate the re-hosting and to perform SDN-based reconfiguration of at least one of the switches to adapt network traffic to the at least one VNF component being hosted at the different one of the servers;
wherein, prior to the re-hosting, at least one of the VNFs has different VNF components thereof hosted at a first set of two or more different ones of the servers;
and
wherein, in response to receiving the indication of the potential failure, the electronic network controller is configured to orchestrate re-hosting of the at least one of the VNFs to a different second set of the servers.

4 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Network adaptation based on assessment of meteorological impact

Life of this patent

Network adaptation based on assessment of meteorological impact

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims19